And the Department of Justice says there's nothing illegal about it, either.

Cody Wilson, like many Texan gunsmiths, is fast-talkin’ and fast-shootin’—but unlike his predecessors in the Lone Star State, he’s got 3D printing technology to help him with his craft.

Wilson’s nonprofit organization, Defense Distributed, released a video this week showing a gun firing off over 600 rounds—illustrating what is likely to be the first wave of semi-automatic and automatic weapons produced by the additive manufacturing process.

Last year, his group famously demonstrated that it could use a 3D-printed “lower” for an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle—but the gun failed after six rounds. Now, after some re-tooling, Defense Distributed has shown that it has fixed the design flaws and a gun using its lower can seemingly fire for quite a while. (The AR-15 is the civilian version of the military M16 rifle.)

The lower, or "lower receiver" part of a firearm, is the crucial part that contains all of the gun's operating parts, including the trigger group and the magazine port. (Under American law, the lower is what's defined as the firearm itself.) The AR is designed to be modular, meaning it can receive different types of “uppers” (barrels) as well as different-sized magazines.

“This is the first publicly printed AR lower demonstrated to withstand a large volume of .223 without structural degradation or failure,” Wilson wrote on Wednesday. “The actual count was 660+ on day 1 with the SLA lower. The test ended when we ran out of ammunition, but this lower could easily withstand 1,000 rounds.”

Already, he says, over 10,000 people have downloaded the lower CAD file, and more have downloaded it through BitTorrent.

“I just made an AK-47 magazine—I’ve got it printing as we speak”

While it may be easy to paint Wilson as a 2nd Amendment-touting conservative, the 25-year-old second-year law student at the Univeristy of Texas, Austin told Ars on Thursday that he’s actually a “crypto-anarchist.”

“I believe in evading and disintermediating the state,” he said. “It seemed to be something we could build an organization around. Just like Bitcoin can circumvent financial mechanisms. This means you can make something that is contentious and politically important—not just a multicolored cookie cutter—but something important. It’s more about disintermediating some of these control schemes entirely and there’s increasingly little that you can do about it. That’s no longer a valid answer.”

He added, “The message is in what we’re doing—the message is: download this gun.”

And he practices what he preaches. The group’s entire set of design files are made available, for free, on DEFCAD, an online library for everything from grips to lowers to magazines.

“I just made an AK-47 magazine—I’ve got it printing as we speak,” he added. “[I’ve got a] Glock 17, we got a bunch coming, man. We’ve got a library of magazines.”

The specific purposes for which this corporation is organized are: To defend the civil liberty of popular access to arms as guaranteed by the United States Constitution and affirmed by the United States Supreme Court, through facilitating global access to, and the collaborative production of, information and knowledge related to the 3D printing of arms; and to publish and distribute, at no cost to the public, such information and knowledge in promotion of the public interest.

Totally legal

So that raises the question: is this legal? For now, it would appear so.

“There are no restrictions on an individual manufacturing a firearm for personal use,” a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) spokesperson told Ars. “However, if the individual is engaged in business as a firearms manufacturer, that person must obtain a manufacturing license.”

Wilson said that he’s applied for a federal firearms license in his own name with the ATF in October, and he expects to hear a response “any day now.” The ATF did not respond to our request for confirmation of Wilson’s claims.

The law student said that anyone with the same type of 3D printer (“SLA resin and P400 ABS on a used Dimension”) could replicate his efforts with “9 to 12 hours” of print time and “$150 to $200” in parts. "We’ve proven that you can build one for $50,” he said, presuming the builder is using lower quality materials. (Dimensions typically sell in the $30,000 range—but Wilson says his results could be duplicated using the less-expensive Ultimaker ($1,500) or Reprap.”)

Assuming Defense Distributed’s AR-15 lower costs around $150 to print, it likely won't end up being price-competitive with other, commercially available polymer AR-15 lowers—a few minutes of Google searching turned up options priced at $135 to $170, depending on the manufacturer.

Of course, lots of 3D printing enthusiasts extol the fact that the price of the technology is rapidly falling—as we reported previously, a California company announced a $600 model last year.

Some experts who have been following the world of 3D printing for a while say that from a policy perspective, not much has changed in terms of firearm production, even if the parts are cheaper to make.

“When you're thinking about it from a policy standpoint [the question is], was this possible before 3D printing? If the answer is yes, what was the existing policy response?” said Michael Weinberg, a staff attorney at Public Knowledge.

“Has this fundamentally changed the dynamic in a way that we need to revisit the response? The answer strikes me as no. It's amazing. You can imagine a world where the 3D printer is accessible to people—I am not convinced that we need a 3D printing-specific solution.”

An earlier model of the 3D-printed AR-15 lower resulted in a crack by the rear takedown pin.

“The guns that will be”

Since December 2012, Wilson and his team have been hard at work on two problems. The first was the fact that the lower’s “buffer tower” (the circular ring part jutting upward that the “upper” fits into) kept breaking—that’s what caused the initial failure that prevented the gun from firing more than six rounds of 5.7x28FN bullets.

To fix that, the group re-engineered the buffer tower so it had increased exterior thickness. “We doubled or tripled the thickness,” Wilson said.

With that fix under their belt, the modern gunsmiths tried firing with .223 Remington bullets (standard in an AR-15), which raised the firing range to about 20 rounds before a failure—but that wasn’t good enough.

By the end of the month, there was a different failure, this time on the “rear takedown pin,” where a metal pin fits between the upper and the lower, connecting them together solidly. There, the 3D-printed plastic was cracking around the pin, making the gun less safe to use.

“There was so much force concentrating around it that that was the failure place,” Wilson said. “At first we started using bigger bosses and using longer pins and realized that it’s still a cross-sectional area. We changed the dimensions of the rear takedown pins.”

He explained that they’ve changed pin design entirely, adding “more surface area around these pins,” as well as an “internal” 90-degree angle, along with various curves and “steps and risers” that take advantage of the fact that the housing is made of plastic, not metal.

“The thing was still built like it would be made out of metal,” he said. “This is about plastic, and everything needs to be curves. It has to act like more of a spring.”

And that, he points out, is the ultimate lesson in gun manufacturing.

“The idea is not to print components for guns that are, but the guns that will be,” he said.

For now, though, Wilson said that Defense Distributed has essentially taken over the bulk of his time, and he’s effectively become a part-time amateur engineer.

“I don’t go to [law school] class, but I do pass the exams—here’s looking at you [American Bar Association]!” he told Ars.

Defense Distributed, Wilson says, receives “around $100” in daily donations, and he has an operating budget of about $2,400 monthly. He says that the next phase will be to publish “primers” teaching people specifically how to make such weapons.

“I don’t consider myself a tech guy, but I do consider myself a crypto-anarchist,” he said.

“I mean the philosophy that Tim May expressed, he predicted WikiLeaks and digital currency. [What I mean is] that the Internet and cryptography are these anarchic tools that can allow for the expanse of citizen action. We like the idea of the market becoming completely black and starving the nation-state from all the money they claim.”

Having trouble squaring this:"Specifically, Wilson said he's looking eventually to become a Class 2 Special Occupational Taxpayer, as licensed under federal law (PDF), which would allow him to become a dealer under the National Firearms Act."

with the whole 'crypto-anarchist / disintermediate' thing. If that's his thing, why abide by all the laws and jump through the bureaucratic hoops to become a dealer?

I love what people are doing with (nearly) consumer-level 3D printing, as well as CNC and similar projects I've seen. It promises to be a majorly disruptive technology, and society needs to be shaken up occasionally.

I don't know that people will be printing up microwaves in whole anytime soon, but regarding just 3D printing consider the number of parts in any given object we own that are made of plastic. The idea of being able to replace these as-needed is awesome, in my opinion. If manufacturers were smart and looking to stay on top of the game, they'd start designing machinery with planned-to-fail components that are easily user-replaceable, then come up with a licensing scheme to cheaply print those components.

As an avid shooter, also, I find the ingenuity going into firearm components reassuring. I wouldn't (yet) trust a 3D printed magazine (see the issues at least early PMAGs had with lip-spread), but it shows people are still willing and capable to engage in rather ingenious problem solving. (Personally, I like my Lancer A5 AWMs and USGI mags. I wonder what it would take to 3D print a Lancer-style mag.)

Having trouble squaring this:"Specifically, Wilson said he's looking eventually to become a Class 2 Special Occupational Taxpayer, as licensed under federal law (PDF), which would allow him to become a dealer under the National Firearms Act."

with the whole 'crypto-anarchist / disintermediate' thing. If that's his thing, why abide by all the laws and jump through the bureaucratic hoops to become a dealer?

My guess is that, while he wants to get these available to people as part of his cause, he wants to make sure he is on the up and up legally. Otherwise he would find himself arrested, where he could not continue with his message anymore.

Maybe it's because I'm not American (and very much not a gun person), and I know it's not a mutually-exclusive, zero-sum endeavour, but it seems that if as much cultural effort was expended on education, poverty reduction and general enabling then things like this wouldn't be necessary.

From what I can tell, we get more mileage out of shaming government** then challenging it. More open networks, more immediate dissemination of information and certainly more engagement of the population in the democratic process would do worlds more than a few token guns.

Having trouble squaring this:"Specifically, Wilson said he's looking eventually to become a Class 2 Special Occupational Taxpayer, as licensed under federal law (PDF), which would allow him to become a dealer under the National Firearms Act."

with the whole 'crypto-anarchist / disintermediate' thing. If that's his thing, why abide by all the laws and jump through the bureaucratic hoops to become a dealer?

Maybe it's because I'm not American, and I know it's not a mutually-exclusive, zero-sum endeavour, but it seems that if as much cultural effort was expended on education, poverty reduction and general enabling then things like this wouldn't be necessary.

From what I can tell, we get more mileage out of shaming government** then challenging it.

with the whole 'crypto-anarchist / disintermediate' thing. If that's his thing, why abide by all the laws and jump through the bureaucratic hoops to become a dealer?

That also struck me as odd, but I'm guessing it's so he can legally distribute.

He seems like an intelligent enough individual to realize two things: the current administration would crucify him if he ran at all afoul of the laws, and it would probably result in considerable damage to the maker movement by way of some half-baked new laws intended to prevent people from making plastic guns.

Which they wouldn't, because a plastic gun within the budget of any vaguely average citizen would catastrophically fail, and we know it. I don't even know if e.g. DARPA could make one; the materials may not even exist to make one reasonably sized. But it wouldn't be the first time that people have advocated for or made laws based on a complete incomprehension.

The lower is significant because it's the part which has "legal" definitions attached to it; all the other parts (barrel, stock, etc) are not classified and are just "junk" as far as the law goes.

Whereas I applaud 3D printing to solve interesting problems I think that making guns out of the tech is just the saddest thing I've ever seen. If only he'd devoted his life to making prosthetics for war heroes or Life Straws for developing countries.

There is so much wrong with this comment I am unsure of wear to start.

You could start by spelling "wear" as "where".

I don't think this is wrong and I don't think it's zero-sum either/or, but I just _do_ not_understand_ the fascination with guns for this purpose. They're not remotely effective (any country's military would just steamroll you) and actually allow you to be recast by authority as some kind of nutjob.

The most effective revolutions, at least in modern times, have been the ones where the powerful have been utterly shamed, not the ones where the populace has taken up arms. You get that by sharing of information and enabling people, economically, to get off their knees, not by putting guns in their hands.

Maybe it's because I'm not American, and I know it's not a mutually-exclusive, zero-sum endeavour, but it seems that if as much cultural effort was expended on education, poverty reduction and general enabling then things like this wouldn't be necessary.

From what I can tell, we get more mileage out of shaming government** then challenging it.

Gun control is now perilously close to depending on thought control. In the 1990s, the tech crowd vigorously defended Phil Zimmerman's right to distribute strong cryptographic tools on the grounds that code (or any other expression of an algorithm) amounted to speech. It will be interesting to see how many of them reverse themselves when the speech in question is a computer-readable gun design.

Why do they care so much about the "lower"? I can see the utility of printing more and/or bigger mags, but the lower.. You already have that part. Otherwise where does your barrel etc come from?

The lower is the part that you have to either buy from an authorized party* (following all applicable laws, like background checks) or build yourself for your gun to be legal. If you know your way around of machine shop tools you could build one right now. With this tech, you no longer need to know your way around a machine shop, so more people could build legal lowers and have a gun without having to register with the authorities.

What I see happening is that the authorities are going to add the barrel or other hard to build part to the list of things that you have to buy from an authorized party.

*I'm leaving out the gun show exemption because I see it being removed at some point.

I applaud the ingenuity and this is just another example of the power of 3D printing. It will be a wonderful day when a cheap printer at home and sites like Fixit allow me to repair pretty much anything broken at home.

On a tangential note. I believe in people having the ability to own their weapons but making sure they are registered appropriately. The ability to print yourself a gun scares me more than just a little. Maybe it makes more sense not to limit guns themselves but the ammunition.

Sorry,but I just shudder at the idea of printable weapons using current 3D printing solutions,because as it's been demonstrated in the article that material fatigue is a serious problem. Hell, looking at the AK's magazine that they fabricated,they've negated one of the biggest advantages of the AK compared to the AR-pattern rifles - the AK's magazine isn't really designed to be discarded,that's why it's a bit heavier and stiffer than a normal AR magazine...

Maybe it's because I'm not American (and very much not a gun person), and I know it's not a mutually-exclusive, zero-sum endeavour, but it seems that if as much cultural effort was expended on education, poverty reduction and general enabling then things like this wouldn't be necessary.

From what I can tell, we get more mileage out of shaming government** then challenging it. More open networks, more immediate dissemination of information and certainly more engagement of the population in the democratic process would do worlds more than a few token guns.

All that glowing ideology stuff doesn't help much when someone is kicking down your door. I'll take my gun over someone else's dreams for what the world should be like any day of the week, because my gun will help keep me safe.

The most effective revolutions, at least in modern times, have been the ones where the powerful have been utterly shamed, not the ones where the populace has taken up arms. You get that by sharing of information and enabling people, economically, to get off their knees, not by putting guns in their hands.

Oh, so Assad just hasn't been shamed enough? As if giving him a swirly will stop him from killing his people? And I guess an armed rebel force and bombing the shit out of Libya didn't matter either?

Polymer lower AR = shiiiat. I'll take that $150 and put it towards a forged version any day.

Considering that a real metal lower from a known manufacturer can be had for around the same (materials) cost of the printed one I don't see any real reason people would want to 3d print one themselves except to say that they did.

Gun lovers are sick creatures. What's so great about giving an 8 year old a brain splattering headshot ?We are disgusted about the fierce and grossly disturbing violence we observe in Near East countries. But we let warmongers sell firearms around the whole country which kills our kids. That makes me sick.

Please don't equate the sick bastards that perpetrate those crimes with the normal law-abiding gun owner,because my the same token of your 'reasoning' (and I use that term VERY loosely) - all black people are radio stealing crack heads,because someone nicked your car stereo.

Polymer lower AR = shiiiat. I'll take that $150 and put it towards a forged version any day.

Considering that a real metal lower from a known manufacturer can be had for around the same (materials) cost of the printed one I don't see any real reason people would want to 3d print one themselves except to say that they did.

Right now there probably isn't, apart from the fact that the technology allows anyone to possess an unregistered AR-15.

As the technology progresses, it will probably get cheaper, more capable, and more ubiquitous. It's going to be hard to control firearms when anyone can print them out cheaply on common household printers.